Enlightened (Enlightenment #3)

by Joanna Chambers

“Do you think you’ll ever grant his wish?” For a long moment, Murdo was silent. “I don’t plan to,” he said at last. “But my father has a way of bending people to his will. He finds your weak spot, and he exploits it.” “Do you have weak spots to exploit, then?” It was an impertinent question—none of David’s business. But he wanted to know the answer.

“Am I—am I well enough to return to Edinburgh, Doctor? To my legal practice?” Murdo spoke before Dr. Logan could say anything. “Back to sitting at your desk till all hours and forgetting to eat, you mean?” he snapped. “Back to walking up and down two long flights of stairs to your rooms?”

Oh Murdo...

“It’s not ugly,” Murdo murmured. “Nothing about you could ever be ugly to me.”

“David,” he said, when they broke apart. “David.” He said David’s name like it meant something all on its own. Like a vow. Like a promise.

“Words have power,” he said. “I held my confession back to punish myself for my infidelity. But when Mary lay dying, I realised I had punished her too. Saying the words was”—a shaking breath—“it was far more powerful than I realised it would be. But without Mary to hear those words, they were stillborn. Sometimes things must be said.”

“I feel as though—” Murdo began, then stopped, seeming to debate with himself whether to continue. When he started up again, his tone was careful. “I feel as though we’re fighting over that part of you. I want you to give it up, give it to me. But you’re still not convinced that what we have together is—right. And I don’t know what I can do to convince you.”

Oh Murdo<3<3

“I didn’t know I wasn’t happy before,” he murmured. “Before what?” Murdo gave a lopsided smile. “Before you. Not that I was actively unhappy. I had plans. Objectives. Things to acquire or achieve. But—” He paused, then said simply, “You make me happy, David.”

Murdo leaned in even closer. “Why should I stop?” he hissed, his mouth twisted in a savage snarl. “Prefer the fantasy, do you? The pure boy who wouldn’t let you so much as touch him? The love of your fucking life?” “He’s not the love of my life, you idiot!” David snapped, incensed by Murdo’s obtuseness. “You are!”

This is not a spoiler, right!?!

It was an idle observation, but one that pulled him up oddly short. He’d cursed Will Lennox plenty of times over the last decade, but never for anything less dramatic than breaking David’s heart. The sheer banality of this reaction—disapproving of the man’s manners, for God’s sake—struck him as somewhat anticlimactic.

Oh David<3